BERLIN, December 21. /TASS/. Police have detained another suspect in the terror attack at a Christmas market in downtown Berlin, the RBB TV channel reported on Wednesday citing law enforcement sources.
The investigators say this is not the perpetrator of the attack. The Bild newspaper reported that the suspect has been already released after an interrogation.
Some media reports said citing police that the suspected terrorist, who steered a truck through crowds of shoppers at a popular Christmas market, was wounded and the law enforcers conducted searches in the medical facilities in the city.
Shortly after the terror attack police detained a suspected perpetrator, a 23-year-old Pakistani refugee. However, investigators later found out that he was not involved in the attack. He was released after 24 hours under arrest due to lack of evidence.
The Bild newspaper reported citing law enforcement sources that police found documents inside the truck that belong to a 21-year-old citizen of Tunisia. The new key suspect in the terror attack, Anis A, had several passports. Police do not rule out that he may be tied with Salafis, a movement within Sunni Islam.
TV reports said Germany’s police were preparing a special operation in North Rhine-Westphalia, in the country’s west, to search for the suspected terrorist.
The tragedy occurred late on Monday when a truck rammed into a crowd of Christmas shoppers at a fair in downtown West Berlin, on Breitscheidplatz near Kurfurstendamm Street. The truck steamrolled on for another 80 meters deeper into the market’s territory. As a result, twelve people were killed and 48, some in critical condition, were taken to hospital.
The Islamic State group (terrorist organization outlawed in Russia) has claimed responsibility for the deadly attack.